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Defending champ Bezuidenhout favourite
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Strong Valderrama link to Leopard Creek
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Spaniard fancied to win again
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Tournament History
First staged in January 2000, at this year's Joburg Open venue - Houghton Golf Club - and won by the now retired, Anthony Wall, the Alfred Dunhill Championship moved to its current venue, Leopard Creek, in 2004.
The tournament was cancelled at late notice last year due to covid-related travel restrictions, so Christiaan Bezuidenhout is looking to defend the title two years after his four-stroke victory in 2020.
The Alfred Dunhill Championship is co-sanctioned between the DP World Tour and the Sunshine Tour and it's the third of three events in-a-row here following the Joburg Open and last week's South African Open.
Venue
Leopard Creek Country Club, Malelane, South Africa.
Course Details
Par 72, 7249 yards
Stroke index in 2020 - 73.14
Set on the edge of the Kruger National Park, the spectacular Gary Player designed Leopard Creek opened in 1996. The signature hole is the par five 13th, which has a green that overlooks Crocodile River, but that's far from the only highlight - the course is visually stunning from start to finish.
Harry the Hippo, who used to reside in the lake adjacent to the 16th hole, is sadly no more. But the camera operators frequently catch sight of leopard, impala, zebra, crocodile and many other species, so Leopard Creek is an interesting venue.
Regardless of the result, the Alfred Dunhill Championship is an event I always enjoy watching.
There was no event here in 2018 as the course underwent an overhaul. The fairways and rough used to be Kikuyu but that's all gone now. They have been replaced by a cynodon warm-season Bermuda grass.
The greens were changed from Creeping Bent to a genetically engineered ultradwarf Bermuda, called Champion G-12 - the same strain planted at Quail Hollow prior to the 2017 US PGA Championship in North Carolina.
The fairways, which are undulating and lined with natural bush and trees, now run faster and firmer, bringing bunkers back in to play.
Leopard Creek has been used for 17 previous editions of this event. Darren Fichardt, Nicholas Lawrence, Hennie Otto and Andrew McLardy all won the Sunshine Tour's Tour Championship here soon after the turn of the century.
On the evidence of the last three renewals, however, Leopard Creek is a very different course now.
Charl Schwartzel once won here with a total of 24-under-par (in 2012). The average winning score of the six winners prior to the renovation was more than 19-under-par. But with absolutely nowhere to hide, the course averaged 74.34 for the week in 2019 and Pablo Larrazabal's winning score was -8.
David Lipsky managed to get to 14-under-par in the first edition after the changes but his was a truly incredible putting performance. He had 12 one-putts on Sunday alone and he was one of only four men to beat Larrazabal's eight-under-par total.
Bezuidenhout managed to get to -14 last year but he was four strokes clear of the rest and getting to double-digits under-par here isn't as easy as it once was.
TV Coverage
Live on Sky Sports form 10:00 on all four days, beginning on Thursday
Last Six Winners with Pre-event Exchange Prices
2021 - Event cancelled
2020 - Christiaan Bezuidenhout -14 20.019/1
2019 - Pablo Larrazabal -8 60.059/1
2018 - David Lipsky -14 270.0269/1
2017 - Event cancelled
2016 - Brandon Stone -21 30.029/1
2015 - Charl Schwartzel -15 6.611/2
2015- Branden Grace -20 25.024/1
What will it take to win the Alfred Dunhill Championship?
With the course changing so much, this is a difficult event to evaluate statistically. Brandon Stone won the final edition before the alterations in 21-under-par. In the three years since, nobody has got near to that.
The first winner following the course changes, Lipsky, ranked 33rd for Driving Distance and 64th for Driving Accuracy and Larrazabal wasn't too straight either. He ranked 43rd for DA and 19th for DD. In contrast, ranked 36th for Distance and 10th for Accuracy.
The nine winners before the changes had an average Driving Distance ranking of 21.77 and an average Driving Accuracy ranking of exactly 20. We can probably conclude that neither driving metric is too critical, although I'd favour accuracy over length.
Prior to the changes, Greens In Regulation was always a key stat. When Spain's Pablo Martin won back-to-back editions in 2009 and 2010, he only ranked 33rd and 41st for Greens In Regulation but he was the only winner in the nine renewals before the alterations to rank outside the top-11 for that stat.
Lipsky only ranked 53rd for GIR in 2018 but I think that will turn out to be an anomaly. Bez ranked second for GIR, Larrazabal ranked third in 2020, and Will Besseling, who finished third behind the Spaniard, topped the GIR stats.
Prior to 2018, the most crucial stat had been Scrambling. Schwartzel only ranked 29th in 2015 and in 2014 Branden Grace only ranked 19th. But Brandon Stone ranked sixth in 2016 and Grace was the first winner in seven years to rank outside the top-three for Scrambling.
Since the changes, Lipsky ranked only 16th and Larrazabal only 33rd but the 2018 runner-up, David Drysdale, ranked fourth, and Joel Sjoholm, who was second to Larrazabal, ranked first for Scrambling.
Bezuidenhout ranked seventh two years ago and the four players to finish tied for second behind him - Richard Bland, Sean Crocker, Adrian Meronk and Jayden Schaper - ranked fifth, eighth, 13th and 30th.
Either side of the course changes, putting has always been an important factor. Stone's putting figures weren't spectacular in 2016. He had a Putting Average ranking of 19th and ranked 12 for Putts Per GIR. But the previous eight winners all had a Putting Average ranking of 11th or better and they all ranked inside the top-12 for Putts Per GIR.
Lipsky ranked fourth for PA in 2018, Larrazabal ranked in 2019 and although he only ranked 19th for Putting Average, Bez holed a number of lengthy putts on Sunday and he ranked second for Strokes Gained Putting. A good week with the flat-stick looks imperative.
Is There an Identikit Winner?
Charl Schwartzel has won the title four times and he's finished runner-up four times. But he's far from the only player to perform consistently well here, so course form used to count for plenty.
In addition to Schwartzel and the two-time winner, Pablo Martin, Ernie Els should have won the event back-to-back, Garth Mulroy finished third when defending in 2012 and Richard Sterne, the 2008 winner, finished fourth in 2009.
A number of players have back-to-back top-10 finishes and numerous players have multiple placed efforts. But we've seen a bit of a change in the last three editions.
Prior to 2018, the previous six renewals had gone the way of a South African, but Zander Lombard was the only one in the first six places in 2018. The first two home in 2019 were Europeans and, although the 2020 edition was won by home hero Bezuidenhout, only two of the top-11 were South Africans.
Is There an Angle In?
The course hasn't changed a lot visually but the change from kikuyu to Bermuda grass has sped up the whole track (especially the greens) and the transformation has brought the scoring down considerably. This is a much harder test now which is why Valderrama appears to correlate very nicely.
Bezuidenhout won here just weeks after winning at Valderrama and there's plenty of other more obscure evidence to suggest the two venues often correlate.
Will Besseling, who was tied for third behind John Catlin at Valderrama in 2020, was also tied for third in this event. Justin Harding, who finished alongside Besseling, was tied for seventh here in 2019.
Connor Syme was eighth in Spain and 11th here, while Johannes Veerman finished tied for 10th at Valderrama and tied seventh here in 2019.
Given their quality, Harding and Bez playing well in their homeland, as well as at a tough place like Valderrama wouldn't have raised any eyebrows. But the other three players to finish in such lofty positions at both events are low ranking players who rarely show up anywhere.
The Valderrama correlation looks like a decent angle in and there were other examples in the previous renewals.
Winner's Position and Exchange Price Pre-Round Four
2021 - No event
2020 - Christiaan Bezuidenhout solo third, trailing by three 4.84/1
2019 - Pablo Larrazabal led by three strokes 1.845/6
2018 - David Lipsky trailed by a stroke 5.95/1
2017 - No event
2016 - Brandon Stone led by three strokes 2.1211/10
2015 - Charl Schwartzel led by five strokes 1.4840/85
2014 - Branden Grace led by a stroke 2.588/5
In-Play Tactics
A fast start is absolutely imperative here. As many as six of the last eight winners were inside the top-four after day one, seven of the last eight winners have been in front at halfway and eight of the last 11 led with a round to go.
Other than Bez, who sat third, the two odd men out sat second and trailed by a stroke. This is not a place to play catch-up and a morning start on Thursday could be a big plus.
Rain on Thursday night helped those drawn PM-AM (including the winner) in 2020 as the course played soft on Friday morning. But I'd definitely favour the Thursday morning starters as, ordinarily, this place gets fast and tough from the get-go.
As demonstrated in the tweet below, an early start is always beneficial. At an event where the course will speed up quickly, and where the track is at its best on Thursday morning, an early start on day one is usually a huge plus.
As many as 19 players broke 70 on Thursday in 2019 and, although there wasn't a huge differential between the AM-PM scores over the first two days, it was noticeable how many early starters on Thursday made hay early on. Ten of the top-12 after round one enjoyed an early start.
The eventual third, Besseling, and the winner, Larrazabal, sat first and second after round one and the two were locked together on the 72nd tee. That fast start really was key as the course just got harder and harder.
Only five players broke 70 on Friday and Sunday and only four managed it in round three. Concentrating on those who have started well in the morning on day one could pay dividends.
Market Leaders
This is an interesting market, dominated by the old and new guard of South African golf.
The defending champ Bezuidenhout heads the betting on the Betfair Exchange and rightly so. He'll be nicely rested after his third-place finish at the Joburg Open two weeks ago.
That effort came two weeks after he'd finished fifth at the Nedbank Golf Challenge.
Course form stands up nicely at Leopard Creek and he's the man to beat.
Louis Oosthuizen is the current second favourite and he looks a terrible price.
Louis has finished runner-up here three times previously, but he's played in the event 13 times, and he couldn't get over the line when in his pomp. Without a win in four years, and not in great form on the LIV Tour, he looks one to oppose given he's missed six of his last nine cuts here.
Charl Schwartzel, who's one of Matt Cooper's each-way selections, has a far better course record than Louis and is in slightly better form given he won on the LIV Tour back in June. He also finished inside the top-10 at the South African Open last week.
This place doesn't appear to suit Dean Burmester, who has missed seven of nine cuts here. I'm happy to swerve the 2014 winner, Branden Grace, who withdrew from the South African Open last week after 11 holes of the second round.
Bezuidenhout won the South Africa Open a week after winning this event two years ago. Last week's South African Open winner, Thriston Lawrence, was sixth at Valderrama in October, but his course form figures, reading MC-MC-MC-49-MC, is uninspiring.
Lawrence is a class act on the up, but Sunday's final round was quite stressful and back-to-back victories could be a big ask.
Selections
I've had a small saver on the favourite, Christiaan Bezuidenhout, and I've also backed the Andalucía Masters winner, Adrian Otaegui.
Otaegui has ticked over nicely since his runaway win at Valderrama. There was a lot to like about his tied 23rd in the South African Open last week, where he ranked second for Driving Accuracy and third for Scrambling.
It took Otaegui a little while to get to grips with Leopard Creek but, after four missed cuts prior to the course changes, he's finished 33rd and 20th post course alterations.
At 40/1 in the Win Only market with the Sportsbook, he looks very fairly priced.
We've seen three different Spaniards win four of the last 14 editions and Otaegui has the right skillset to emulate Alvaro Quirós, Pablo Martin and Pablo Larrazabal.
Selections:
Christiaan Bezuidenhout @ 11.521/2
Adrian Otaegui @ 41.040/1 (Win only - Sportsbook)
I'll be back later with the Find Me a 100 Winner column but given there's only this event on the DP World Tour to concentrate on this week, I won't be doing an In-Play Blog. I'll be back on Monday with the De-brief though.
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*You can follow me on Twitter @SteveThePunter